Cambodia Again
by 3lanterns
Summary: Lara raids yet another tomb in Cambodia. This is the early days raiding unsupported and alone when she meets an unusual stranger.
1. Chapter 1 Firefight

I don't own the Lara Croft character, and I don't profit from writing this, I'm probably too old to be writing this, in fact I probably should be doing something else

**Cambodia, ...again**

Lara moved swiftly and quietly across the old stones. She had watched the temple for a few minutes before leaving the cover of the jungle and heading toward the entrance. The front of the ancient temple was covered with creeping vines but the carved rock archways rose menacingly upward into the jungle canopy. She crossed the rock paved plaza, paused just a moment at the entrance, drew her pistols and entered.

Just inside, she paused again to allow her eyes to adjust to the dim light. Careful to press against the rough wall, in order to not be highlighted against the doorway, she looked forward into the passageway. An old temple hallway with damp cool stones would be the perfect hiding place for a large snake or worse. She glanced at her twin Glock 17's. You could buy a lot of reassurance with a couple magazines of 9mm parabellums.

The end of the passageway turned into blackness. Lara sidestepped to the side of the corridor, careful to avoid falling through the pit trap she knew would be there. The Khmer builders liked their traps. The hole through the floor would surely have deposited her with the snakes, perhaps with broken legs. Beyond the trap the passage lead gently downward. She traded one Glock for an electric torch, flicked in on and headed down.

—

Ryan hated snakes. How he ended up in these sorry, third world backwaters he wasn't sure, but it always seemed there were snakes. The reason he knew, was that it was his job was to bring back proof. The news agency sent him to places where there were only rumors and Ryan brought back proof. It was Cambodia this time. Two days ago he had built a small tree stand, along a jungle road, set up house and watched.

The idea was that if the anti government forces were in this part of the country, they would have to move along this road sooner or later. Ryan's plan was to watch the road and when the rebels did move he would take photos of the equipment. That should be proof enough that someone was moving military hardware against the government.

He was looking around for snakes that might drip into his blind when he heard the trucks. He snatched his camera and waited.

—

This particular Cambodian temple had been on Lara's list to raid for years now. The rumors of a growing insurgency had moved up this particular expedition. Still she had done the research and knew what she was doing. She stopped and threw a chunk of loose rock through a shaft of sunlight in the passageway ahead.. A pause, then a roar as the roof collapsed.

Further back in the corridor Lara had to wait a few minutes for the dust to clear before she began to move forward, picking her way through the debris. She deftly scaled the rubble and climbed to the next level..

The hallway turned back on itself and Lara headed back the direction she had come. She surveyed the corridor ahead and knew that the next step would take skill and concentration. Lara smiled at this. She took a deep breath then launched herself down the passage like a gymnast. A trigger dropped a gate with sharpened bamboo spikes which fell milliseconds behind her sprint. A duck and a roll, and spring loaded stakes hissed through the air where she had been. She ran on as fast as she could even though a gap was opening in the floor of the passage way ahead. At the edge of her vision she saw another gate begin its fall to where the cruel points would crash to the ground at the edge of the gap. Khmer priests had carefully and lovingly sharpened those spikes hundreds of years ago, with the one intention of piercing and crushing someone like Lara. But she didn't slow. She reached down deep now, for her last reserves of speed. Like a long jumper her foot hit the edge of the gap and launched she herself out into the void. She felt the gate snatch at the back of her booted heel and cursed under breath, afraid for a moment that it had slowed her forward momentum too much, but with a slap she reached out grabbed the lip at the other side of the pit, and with an audible grunt her body slammed into the edge on the other side.

There was no question of letting go. With feet and arms she first lifted herself, got one arm over the lip, then two, then pulled herself up to the other side and into the passageway. She sat for a moment and looked over the edge into the darkness of the pit below, likely full of snakes or other nasties. "Sorry guys," she said aloud, "Not today." Next she examined her boot heel. The bamboo had split the leather and taken a piece out of the sole. "What a shame. Good English leather too." she muttered.

Lara now found herself at the entrance to a circular room. The room itself was a dome and in the center there dangled a rope, which led upward through the ceiling. Shining her torch upward she could see at least five concentric rock rings, one about every 3 meters before the rope disappeared. She examined the rope as closely as she could for damage. Careful not to put any weight on it. It was made of some type of fiber. It was old, there was no doubt, but it was as thick as a man's wrist. It looked like it would probably hold her, but there was no telling the condition of the anchoring mechanism far above in the ceiling. She had 50 meters of lightweight nylon cord in her knapsack but she could think of no way to anchor it at the top. "Oh well." she thought, "if it was good enough for the old boys, it will have to do for me."

—

The four trucks had passed leaving diesel fumes hanging in the air. Ryan was back to worrying, now, but now he wasn't worrying about snakes. There had been one Soviet era command car and three - two and a half ton trucks, obviously American, obviously left over from the Vietnam War. The troops in the back were not wearing any uniforms so presumably they were not Government troops. But Ryan wasn't so sure. It nagged at him that the equipment was so well maintained for rebels stuck in jungle camps. It had also surprised him that the trucks had been traveling into the interior. Perhaps supplies going in, but rebel troops should have been coming out of the jungle.

Ryan was curious enough that he packed up his blind and tree stand and climbed back down his tree. Off the road, covered in the brush was an old Honda dirt bike. This he kick started and headed slowly up the jungle road after the trucks.

—

Lara leapt as high as she possibly could, snatched the rope well above her head and began to hand over hand up the rope. It reminded her of boarding school gym class when they would race up the rope to tag a ceiling support where the rope was anchored. 6 meters up, at the second level this notion was disturbed. A solid thud and a tug from below made Lara glance downward. What she saw was far more inspiring than any Gym teacher. The first dome, through which she had climbed had collapsed inward. Has she been seconds slower she would have been caught and crushed by the ring of stones.

As the second level started to cave inwardly, she shot up the rope, hand over hand. Now she fairly flew, hands and arms quickly pulling the rope in, legs and feet clamping and extending. The third level collapsed on air, where her feet had been and gave a mighty jerk to the rope. She slipped back down a few inches before she caught herself. "You'll have to do better than that, Lara." she thought as she climbed onward. Arms burning now with exertion and nearly choking on the dust that was being blown upward by the collapsing tunnel, she noticed as she passed the fifth level that it was not a dome but rather a ledge. With a gasp and a push she swung out sideways and let go of the old rope just as it came loose of its anchor at the top of the chamber and slithered back down through the hole she had just climbed . As her feet touched down on a solid rock floor, she crouched for just a second wondering if this level too would fall in. The rumbling of collapsed masonry below her died. In the silence she could hear only her own heavy breathing. Apparently this was the top level.

The chamber was lighted by tiny shafts of light through the masonry of the domed ceiling. This she knew was the highest chamber in the temple, the dome supported by the archways of the temple. The walls were carved with bas relief demons and across from where she crouched, lighted by a wide shaft of sunlight was a carved stone altar. The object on the altar was what caught Lara's attention. In fact, it was the focal point of the whole chamber. About as big as a cricket ball it appeared to be a Frog Demon carved from red volcanic rock. But what really drew her attention were the eyes of the little demon.

The eyes gleamed dimly through countless years of dust. Made of rubies as big as Lara's thumbnail, the eyes bulged out, as if looking for their next victim. "Well, little guy," she said to the idol, "It looks like you are coming with me."

The way out was at the opposite side of the shrine. It was a rock door tapered at the edges so that it could not be pulled from the outside yet braced on the inside so that it could not fall or be pushed into the shrine. With a heave and a push, Lara pushed the wooden blocks to the side and the door fell open in a swirl of dust. She picked up her knapsack and the idol and stepped out into the sunlight.

—

Ryan stopped his ancient motorcycle every 5 or 6 minutes and listened for sounds of the rebel trucks moving through the jungle. Sometimes he could see the exhaust plumes when the road crossed downhill of him but mostly it was triple canopy jungle so he would have to stop, kill the engine and listen for the convoy. The track got worse and worse and after about an hour Ryan could tell that the trucks had stopped. Once again he covered the Honda off the side of the road and carefully crept forward.

He came upon the trucks parked spaced widely apart, backed into the trees. There were two security guards but they were smoking and lolling around at the back of the trucks. Ryan rarely carried a weapon and he knew he had pushed his luck about as far as he liked, following them here. He had no idea where the rest of the troops were or what they might be doing. Following them on foot into the jungle could turn into a disaster. Maybe he could get a shot of whoever was in the command vehicle so he climbed a tree with a good view of the trucks and settled down to watch and worry about snakes.

—

Li Than was a careful man. He knew the location of all the known ruins in this part of Cambodia his position at the Interior Ministry gave him access to such information. What it didn't give him was the location of the particular artifact he wanted. Li had been systematically looting the ancient ruins and temples of Cambodia for years. It had been a hobby of his to collect wonderful works of art created by the previous kingdoms occupying the land and he had neatly compiled them into his own private collection. He considered himself the curator of the beautiful and valuable artifacts of his country. That no one else was permitted to see or study them was not his concern.

He had been waiting for Lady Croft to make this visit. When she had applied for a travel visa to Cambodia, Li had his men travel to the provinces likely to be visited by Lady Croft and start the rumor of insurgency. Nothing serious enough to require the government to send troops, just enough so that Li could control access, letting Croft in and keeping others out.

After that it had been a small thing to follow her to this particular temple. Known to contain traps, Li decided to let her do the dirty work of retrieval. Soon another piece of history would be his.


	2. Chapter 2 Li Than

Lara stepped out onto a ledge near the top dome of the temple. She tied off her rope and dropped it down to the jungle floor. Where she stood, was above the tree canopy and she looked out over the sea of green. The sun was low in the west and she would need to hurry before darkness fell. Then she heard a commotion in the front of the temple in the plaza she had crossed hours earlier. Balancing along the shelf she moved around to the front. There below, spread out across the plaza, were men with assault rifles disconcertingly pointed towards her.

"Ah Lady Croft, I see you have managed to reach the sacred chamber of the Khmer Temple of Shiva." It was an Asian man some fifty meters below shouting up at her.

She thought she recognized him but he was far away and the light was poor down in the jungle. "Who the devil are you?" she shouted. She was playing for time now.

"Merely a servant of the Cambodian people and I have come to confiscate what you have stolen from our ancestors." He shouted back.

"The Khmer were bloodthirsty butchers. Who would claim them as ancestors?" Lara noticed men beginning to filter around the sides of the temple and knew she would need to move very soon.

The man shouting was clearly in charge and losing patience. "Perhaps so Lady Croft. Don't make me spill more blood. I would like the Ruby Frog Demon. You surely have it."

"Oh this little trinket." She raised the idol up in the setting sun. The Rubies flashed red in the evening light. Now every eye in the plaza was on her and bright red statue. "If this is all you are after then here." And with that she flung it high out into the air over the armed men and the plaza. Every eye watched it arc out into nothingness. There was a surge and men scrambled toward where it would land. Not Lara's eyes though.

—

Li's heart leapt in his chest. The red idol arched out over the plaza and fell down into the jungle vegetation. Spared the hard stones of the plaza, the demon fell through the lush growth of the canopy, gradually slowing and coming to rest in the thick duff of the forest floor.

Li marked where the object had fallen and detailed two men to come with him and search for it. He also directed his Lieutenant to find Croft and finish her.

---

Lara dove back around the dome, hooked into her rope and dove head first from the top of the temple. Belaying herself with her left hand, her Glock appeared in her right and began to find targets in the jungle below. Moments before she reached the ground, automatic weapons fire began to search for her along the side of the temple raining showers of rock chips down on her. Her descent controlled as it was, dropped her unceremoniously into the brush and a tree limb smacked the side of her head so hard her vision blurred for second. Shaking her head, she felt around for her dropped pistol and scampered off into the darkening jungle.

—

The sounds of the fire fight in the jungle took the attention of the guards and Ryan felt safe enough to climb a nearby tree. It had a good view of the parked trucks . They would need to return soon or he would lose the light. They would probably be here soon.. There was nothing like a good fire fight to get people moving.

Within minutes the small arms fire died away and men began to come out of the bushes toward the trucks. A few minutes after that Ryan saw the man who was in charge. Li Than was Deputy Minister for Interior. Ryan knew him because Li was the one who had denied Ryan's request to visit this part of Cambodia. Claiming that the area was too dangerous for civilians, Li had requested that the Cambodian State Department throw Ryan out of the country. Which they would have done except when the officials had come to escort him to the airport he had already unaccountably left of his own accord. Of course he had not left. He had bought an old motorcycle and driven off into the interior.

Ryan snapped a roll of film and tried to figure it out. Why would Li be out here? And if he was in charge of the rebels who was shooting back in the jungle?

Li Than gave some instructions to the guards and another man, then he tossed a leather bag into the back seat of his command vehicle and he and his driver pulled out onto the track and headed back toward town.

Ryan bagged his equipment and started down the tree. Nearly half way down his foot slipped and he crashed through the lower limbs and bushes and sagged down into the forest muck. This earned him a volley of automatic weapons fire. The men had heard his fall and responded with what they thought was reasonable force. Twigs and leaves rained down on him as others joined in the one sided fire fight.

Staying low he cursed under his breath and slowly turned around to see a striking woman, her red hair in a long braid crouched in front of him. And, oh yes, she was pointing twin pistols, whose 9mm barrels looked as large as cannons, right at him.

Lara calmly explained, "You have seven and a half seconds to tell me who you are and just exactly what you are doing here."

Ryan's eyes flew open wide and his brain began to work in overdrive, "NoahRyanI'macontaractreporterforReuters.Heretoreportontheinsurgency" he spat out rapid fire. "ReallyIam." he added though he knew he was sounding like a goon.

"I'm not sure what you just said," replied Lara, "but you don't have a gun. You're probably the only person within miles who isn't carrying a gun. Which seems pretty stupid." she looked over Ryan's shoulder "Well, Noah Ryan, it looks like you found the insurgency." gesturing toward the men along the road shooting at them, with the barrel of her pistol.

Ryan suddenly realized that he wasn't going to die immediately looked behind him. "Those aren't the rebels." he said, "Those are probably Li Than's personal soldiers."

Lara asked, "And who is Li Than?"

"He's a minor bureaucrat. Part of the Department of the Interior. Has a lot of influence around here." replied Ryan, gathering his gear. "You just missed him. He took off before these guys all showed up. Anyway I'm done here. Apparently there is no rebellion. Probably, Li isolating this part of the jungle interior for goodness knows what reason."

Lara could think of a pretty good reason. "We got off on the wrong foot." she said, "I'm Lara Croft. I do archeological surveys. Say, would this Li Than know anything about antiquities?" she asked.

The jungle patrol had stopped firing for now but it looked like four or five of them were getting ready to inspect whatever had made the noise.

"Oh sure," answered Ryan, "He's the big antiquities guy at the Interior Department. Sorry to introduce myself and run, but I've gotta run."

Lara holstered her Glocks. "Stay close," she said, "maybe I can get you out of here alive."

"I can get myself out of here," Ryan shot back, but he fell in behind her anyway.

They moved as quietly as they could parallel with the road until they were 20 or so meters from the nearest truck. Their attackers were being more cautious. They were just now entering the brush on the other side of the road. "See that lorry," motioned Lara, "That's our taxi out of here."

Ryan started to protest but Lara drew her pistols. "Right. Good idea." he replied. Crouching and moving quickly, Ryan broke cover and ran toward the truck. He was almost across the road when one of the men farther down the road saw him. Shouting, he opened fire and bullets stitched a dusty path up the road. Ryan stood up and ran full speed to the truck. He lunged for the cab, wasted a few precious seconds figuring it out and started the engine. A couple well placed rounds from Lara's Glocks kept the armed men disorganized and ducking for cover. In short order the exhaust stack belched black diesel smoke and Ryan pulled out in a long slow arc toward the vegetation on the other side of the road and Lara stepped from cover and jumped in with him.

An American Army two and a half ton truck has the carrying capacity of a big pickup, but it is a large, lumbering hulk of metal, geared low for towing and mud, with a heavy frame and thick metal cargo box. However, once it gets moving it can still drive faster than a man can run. It looked to Lara like they were going to get away. That is until she saw a man remove an RPG from one of the other trucks. The truck wasn't going to outrun a rocket propelled grenade. "Brace yourself Ryan." she commented dryly, " This might get rough."

Ryan glanced at her sideways. At that moment the rocket slammed into the tailgate of the truck. The explosion threw both of them forward, shattered the rear window and sent little pieces of shrapnel through the windscreen. The canvas caught fire and the rear cargo box crumpled as if it were made of cardboard. The truck was a moving disaster, but the two and a half ton truck had been built to take abuse and this one was still moving. Ryan worked the gears and stood on the gas pedal.

Lara shook her head and tried to look through the smoke and broken glass. "You can bet that right now two more lorries are starting up and headed our direction." As if in answer the rear drive shaft began to make an ominous banging noise.

"Don't worry about the drive shaft," shouted Ryan, "It won't matter in about 5 minutes. We're losing fuel from the external tanks." A look out the doors indeed showed a stream of diesel fuel pouring onto the ground. "Hold on." He shouted again. Despite the banging of the drive train the truck was beginning to pick up speed and was bouncing and careening along the rutted dirt road. "Best to use the fuel before it all pours out onto the ground."

They had gone another quarter mile when the drive shaft gave a sharp bang and let go. Ryan had the engine gunned as fast as it would go, so when the drive shaft broke the engine roared loudly before making a loud thunk and freezing up. Black smoke and steam poured from under the hood. "Time to head for the jungle." commented Lara.

"Not yet," said Ryan grimly, "I've got a trick or two left." He jumped from the cab and ran up the road. Not far up the track from where the truck had died, he stopped at the side and began to uncover his motorcycle.

Lara smiled broadly. "You brought me a motorbike." She said sweetly.

"My bike," said Ryan, " you'll have to hold on tight Miss Croft."

"Ok Ryan, sure you're my new best friend and everything, but I don't ride on the back of any bike. It's your motorbike it's true, but these are my pistols." she said drawing a Glock and pointing it casually skyward.

Ryan started to reply but was cut of by the sound of diesel engines approaching. He shrugged and tossed her the key. Lara mounted the old motor bike and kicked the starter over. Ryan clambered on behind her. She gunned the throttle and shot off onto the road, kicking up dust that hung for just a moment in the twilight air.


	3. Chapter 3 In the Dark

"Hey you took the wrong turn," shouted Ryan above the engine noise. It had proved impossible to hang onto the seat of the motorcycle without falling off on the rutted dirt road. He had needed to hold onto Lara in order to keep from being thrown off balance or being thrown from the bike himself. He has tired of trying to keep his arms and hands in appropriate places on Croft's body. He didn't want to signal anything more than just trying to stay aboard. They had been riding long enough for the adrenaline to settle out of their systems and Ryan now was looking forward to a shower and a bed. "You should have turned back there," He shouted again, "This isn't the way back to Batdambang."

Lara stopped the bike and they both got off. "Well love," she said, "I've been trying to think of a way to tell you this but we aren't going back to Batdambang. I'm following Li Than and he isn't going back."

"Well I'm not following Li Than," replied Ryan, "and I need to get to a phone to tell my editor that there isn't a revolution. Apparently it's just another corrupt minor government official making it look like there's a revolution so he can run some scam without interference. This is not big news for a country like Cambodia."

"Listen Ryan, I can leave you here and you can hitch back to Batdambang, or you can ride with me and in the next village we'll see if we can find a phone and you can call whoever you need to call. Maybe you can arrange for transport out of here. Either way this motorbike and I are headed back into the interior." Lara said emphatically.

Ryan did some quick mental gymnastics. It was dark now and hitchhiking would not get him anywhere till morning. Perhaps this Lara Croft was headed toward something that would be a story. Most likely not. Still it was better than a lonely dark road. "It's still my motorcycle." he muttered as he got back on.

They bought gas for the bike in a little roadside village. Ryan was able to find a mama san who rented a cell phone to anyone who needed to make calls. He told his editor why he suspected the rumors of revolution were false but that he needed to follow up on Li Than. "I'll make you a deal," Ryan told Lara, "You let me tag along and find out about Li, and I'll let you ride my motorcycle."

They ate rice, off banana leaves, from a little stall, then they both climbed on the bike and headed off into the dark.

Hours later Lara stopped along a dark stretch of track deep in the jungle. The sound of the motorbike seemed to hang in the air even after they had stopped. She switched off the light and plunged them into near total darkness. Almost by instinct Lara walked a small distance into the jungle along an overgrown side road. Parked out of sight, back in the trees, hidden by cut branches, Lara uncovered a vehicle. It was an old jeep. The top was off and the windscreen was lowered onto the hood but it was obviously in good condition. Ryan followed her to the rear of the 4 wheel drive and watched as she put the tail gate down.

"Down this track on the other side of the road, is a large Vishnu temple complex. Li Than will come here because this is the companion temple to the one we were at yesterday." explained Lara.

"We were at a temple?" asked Ryan.

"Don't be impertinent." replied Lara, "The Khmer Temple of Excellency to Shiva was where we ran into Li yesterday even though you did not know it. He stole from me a certain item which has great meaning to this Temple. The Khmers believed that Vishnu and Shiva were the great balancers of the cosmos, one the destroyer and the other the life giver. They constructed these two temples to balance the worlds as they saw it. The problem is that if you bring the weight from one end of the teeter totter to the other end then you loose the balance. Being enlightened as he probably is, Li won't understand this. He will try to bring my artifact here, where it doesn't belong. We need to make sure that doesn't happen."

"So which is Vishnu" asked Ryan, "Destroyer or Life giver?"

"Oh he's the Destroyer." remarked Lara.

Ryan replied, "I was afraid you were going to say that."

They sat in the front seats of the jeep, waiting in the darkness. Dozing and talking they passed the early hours of the morning. The closeness of the motorcycle ride had created an inevitable tension that was now palpable between the two of them. Lara began to wonder about this man who had literally fallen out of a tree in the jungle. He was dressed in sensible jungle clothes, long pants, loose shirt and worn jungle boots. He was not a large man, or a rugged looking man. Though he looked like someone who should be typing at a computer terminal, he appeared to be quite at home in the mud and damp of the forest. Lara realized that in twelve hours of fairly hard going she had not heard him complain once.

"Doesn't all this put an end to your story about the revolutionaries." asked Lara.

"Maybe," said Ryan, "Maybe there's a story about Li Than."

"Why wouldn't Reuters send a local reporter to get this?" asked Lara, curious now.

" I don't report for Reuters. I check facts for Reuters. They have sent several reporters to try and find this story. It wasn't working out. I'm more like senior field staff, verifying stories in hard to get to places so the news service doesn't get a black eye by getting wrong information."

"So you've done this before?"

"Some. Just not always in southeast Asia." Ryan wore a rueful look. "Usually I work in South or Central America. Just lucky this time I suppose. I can't help wondering about a beautiful woman archeologist or whatever it is you do, tramping around by herself in the jungles of Cambodia. There's got to be a story there."

They both gazed into the darkness for a quiet minute. Again Lara found herself unexpectedly impressed. Unlike most men he had not taken the opportunity to talk about himself. What was even more impressive was that he had complimented her without coming on to her and invited her to tell about herself without prying.

"Well I dig up the odd artifact." answered Lara after a few minutes. "Have since I was young. In fact it's the family business you could say."

Ryan asked about her again, "This family business, does it involve trafficking illegal archeological artifacts?"

"Believe me," Lara smiled this time, "The pieces I retrieve, you wouldn't want my competitors to have."

"Family business?" he asked.

"Well mum and dad are out of business. Dead actually. They've left the business to me. You see it's all I've really known. Even Oxford was all about Archeology. Now there's not really any family left." This was more than Lara had talked about herself with any stranger in a long time but she somehow felt comfortable.

"I'm sorry for your loss." Ryan commented, "Family can be nice to have around."

"As business partners?" Lara asked surprised.

It was Ryan's turn to be surprised. "No." he laughed, "as family."

She rather liked his laugh. "Noah?" Lara hesitated, "Can I call you Noah?"

"Everyone who knows me does." he smiled at her in the darkness.

She saw the flash of his teeth in the shadow of his battered baseball cap. "Noah, a man like yourself must have a woman in every port. What do you know about having a family?" This was a statement rather than a question.

Ryan returned to staring out through the windscreen. The minutes passed. Lara wondered if she had gone too far, but then dismissed the thought. If he was trying to impress her he was doing a good job. If he couldn't take a brush off like that then his feelings really were too tender.

"One port." Noah answered after a bit.

"One port?" asked Lara, "What do you mean?"

"Buenos Aires," said Noah, "One port, one wife and one son."

He paused for another second but continued, "His name is Diego and he's fifteen. Her name is Nila and she is wonderful. The most beautiful woman in the world, in fact. She's an attorney for South American Charities. We've been married eighteen years in August and..." He swallowed hard, "... I haven't seen either of them for three weeks, because," and here his voice switched back to the hard tone he usually used," as I mentioned before, I've been checking facts for Reuters."

Lara felt the wave of oh-so-familiar loneliness. Here she was, sitting in the jungle, tens of thousands of miles from home. But now, home was merely an abstraction to her, a place to store her gear and rest between raids. If a trap fell on her in the next few hours she would likely not be missed for weeks.

"Now it's my turn to be sorry." said Lara though she was unsure of who to feel sorry for.

"Lara, I hope I can call you Lara, don't be sorry for me. In a few days Nila will meet me at the airport in Argentina. You'll be flying back to England and no Mom and Dad." answered Noah.

They both considered this for awhile staring into the darkness. The sky was just now beginning to lighten in the east.

It wasn't the first time Lara had felt overwhelmed by loneliness. Noah Ryan was a one of the best. Not one of the best motorcycle drivers and he certainly wasn't much with guns. Maybe he wasn't even a very good husband or father, though she doubted this. But apparently he was loyal. He could watch her back and most splendid of all he didn't grouse about being in the jungle. All of which did nothing for her loneliness. So she took refuge where she had always taken refuge, in raiding

"Listen Noah, there is a shotgun behind the seat. Just before dawn I am going into that temple. You let me know if Li Than shows up. He's gotten the better of me once already and I have no intention of his doing so again.

"Fair enough," said Ryan, "I suggest we stop feeling sorry for ourselves and figure out how to keep Li Than from bringing the treasures of Shiva and Vishnu together.


	4. Chapter 4 Sudden Death

As Li Than's truck ground to a halt in the morning light dust spiraled and eddied past and made streamers in the light filtering through the forest canopy. It had been disappointing to him that his men had failed to kill Lara Croft the previous day. It would likely mean that he would encounter her today. If this was the case, he had four heavily armed men with him. Still it would be he and he alone who would enter the Khmer Vishnu temple.

He paid little attention to the old stories of the opposing virtues of Shiva and Vishnu. These were myths, stories spun by ancient monks in a vain attempt to protect the treasures of the temples. He intended to unlock the vaults of the Khmer Hindus with the Ruby Idol of Shiva. What awaited him, he was sure, was unimaginable wealth.

Consulting his map he directed his driver to turn from the main road, down an overgrown trail. Crashing through the new jungle undergrowth, the truck disappeared into the gloom.

—

Compared to the Vishnu temple, the Shiva temple was an delightfully light and cheery place. Where the Shiva temple had ascended to a tower the Vishnu temple descended into the bowels of the earth. Where the one allowed occasional shafts of sunlight to pierce the darkness, the other was dark and Lara moved carefully by the light of her electric torch.

She had read of the Vishnu monk's penchant for hiding entrances. It turned out that the entrance release was a tile, ten feet above the ground in the second antechamber. She had been looking in the correct room but the weak light of dawn meant she had to shine her torch up to near the ceiling of the chamber. Ryan helped her pull a block into position below the release switch. The entrance to the lower temple opened across the room. Ryan wandered off to watch the outside of the temple and the sunrise. Lara drew her pistols and stepped into the gloom of the ancient corridor.

The way descended steeply at first then more gradually. There were a series of pit and stake traps but she was expecting these and skipped through them with the grace of a dancer. Eventually the passage descended into water. Taking a great gulp of breath she dived and over the next few minutes performed a series of explorations inside the underwater maze.

There were two grated exits and eventually she found two levers. Near each lever was a inscription in ancient Sanskrit. She surfaced once more for air and made her choice. Translated, the lever she chose read "Destruction". "Who wouldn't choose 'Destruction' over 'Sudden Death,'" she thought to herself. She swam quickly through the now open gate and surfaced in a stone courtyard.

—

As usual Ryan was looking around for snakes when Li Than arrived. There were five of them, including Li. The other four carried their automatic weapons like they knew what they were doing and Ryan was glad that he had agreed with Lara to hike along the overgrown trail rather than drive. The others would not suspect Ryan and Croft were already here. Surprise would be on their side for a few minutes more.

When the Cambodians entered the temple Ryan sat back down to wait and to worry. What was he doing here? The conversation with Croft had reminded him of his family. He wasn't going to be much good to them punched full of AK-47 holes. But soon he began to worry about Lara. How was he going to warn her of Li's approach?

—

Li Than cursed quietly. This of course was drown out by the sound of the man's screams. The fool had fallen into one of the tiger traps within the first corridor. Soon enough his cries for help came to a gurgling stop.

They were wasting time. If Croft had found the hidden entrance she was probably already inside. Worse perhaps she had already taken what was rightfully his. They would have to take drastic measures.

—

Lara looked around. The courtyard appeared to have no entrance other than the pool and was ringed by two ascending balconies on three sides and a stone cliff on the fourth. A ramp to the second level had collapsed but she managed to jump and catch hold of a finger width ledge along the cliff. She climbed sideways along this edge, up and to the left, until she hung over the surface of the second level.

Anciently the stairs had wound upward along the outside wall of the second level but now sections of the stairs had collapsed. Lara performed a series of running jumps where she would leap over the collapsed section and land on the next set of intact stairs. Once, however, the landing collapsed, crashing down under her weight. Violently she threw herself upward to grab the tread of the next stair and pull herself up.

She rested here for a moment, breathing hard. "Maybe this is nature's way of advising me to lose a few kilograms." she muttered to herself.

—

Ryan was startled when they came back through the stone arched entrance. There were four of them now. From the back of the truck they removed wooden boxes of what appeared to be ammunition or explosives.

As quietly as possible he followed them through the jungle to where the back of the stone temple abutted a steep cliff. The men carefully unpacked what appeared to be blocks of explosives and set them against the rock of the ancient wall. This was no government sponsored archeology expedition. They meant to pillage the Vishnu temple and steal its secrets.

Ryan shook his head and wondered where Lara was.

—

Up closer to the third balcony, the stairs were less deteriorated and she was able to climb more easily to that level. She rounded the top level and spotted an arched alcove carved into the rock of the cliff face. She smiled and passed into the darkness of the shrine. Unlike the Shiva Frog Demon, who seemed positively jolly now, the Vishnu Demon lurked in the shadows at the back of the shrine. This idol was stained green with emerald scales. Instead of smiling eyes this idol had teeth and claws

Lara studied the dark enclosure. Wrapping a short length of rope around the base of the pedestal which held the idol she gave it a sharp tug. Three things happened simultaneously. The pedestal tipped but remained upright. The idol rolled off and into Lara's now outstretched arms as she crouched below the pedestal. Two giant frames of spikes smashed together in the air where the idol had been a split second earlier.

Pleased with herself Lara stepped back out onto the balcony and into the bleak sunlight. Gunfire suddenly erupted outside the temple. "Oh good," she thought, "Ryan, must have found them." She began to uncoil her rope for the descent, when at that moment an explosion ripped through the temple complex.

—

Ryan pressed himself into the soft muck of the forest floor. Gunfire ripped the leaves and trees above him. He was pretty sure that despite firing the shotgun in the air three times they hadn't spotted his location. A large snake crawled past him, obviously disturbed by the noise of the gun fire, heading for the deep jungle. Using a low crawl, uncomfortably similar to the snake he began to move.

—

Li Than stepped through the rubble into the inner courtyard of the Vishnu temple. Two of his men came through with him. One was cut down immediately by gun fire. As Li broke through the smoke and dust of the explosion, he saw Croft on the other side of the enclosure dangling from a rope. From behind a large piece of fallen wall the two of them poured fire toward her.

She was moving fast though and very hard to hit. But Lara's luck was not good. A stray bullet ripped through her rope and she fell 5 meters to the surface of the second balcony. She was game though. One of Li's men broke from cover and ran toward her. In flash her pistols were drawn and the man went down in a hail storm of 9mm's.

She rolled to the back edge of the shelf. The fact that Li and his man were below her, placed the front of the rock balcony in front of her like a shield. She was trapped though. She couldn't move or even stand without coming under their guns.

"You're not playing the way you are supposed to Lady Croft." Li called across the courtyard. "Kindly give me the Vishnu artifact and I will allow you to live."

" No thanks Li," Lara shouted from cover. "We tried that last time and it didn't work out so well."

"You have no hope." He said, trying to be convincing. "We have you covered in every possible direction. Of course we can't come up, but you certainly will never make it down alive."

"Oh I'm quite comfortable here," replied Lara, "I've got everything I need for a long stay."

Li tried something new, "If you are thinking your compatriot may help you out of this. You are very wrong. My men caught and killed him in the jungle a few moments before we entered the temple." This was a lie but she hardly knew that.

Lara thought about Ryan. He was a good man but not much in a fire fight. The thought of him dead saddened her immensely.

"Lady Croft," Li shouted, getting angry now, "If you will throw down your pistols we will put down our weapons and we can talk about this some more. It would be difficult indeed for us to climb up to you." Li looked back at his hired killer and shook his head.

"Ok, Li, you come out from behind whatever rock you're hiding behind and I'll put down my pistols." Lara replied.

Li scooped up the Kalashnikov from one of his fallen men and emerged from cover. Holding them both out to his sides by their straps he walked casually out into the open and dropped them to the stone pavement which surrounded the pool. Lara got up from where she had been pressed at the back of the ledge and looked at Li. He was indeed unarmed. As Li walked forward Lara stood and looked into the courtyard below.

Li was standing below her smiling calmly. The water of the pool now looked clouded and ripples raced across its surface. "Did you bring the Ruby Shiva idol?" she asked though she already knew the answer.

"Why Miss Croft, an archaeologist of your imminence must know the legends. That when Shiva and Vishnu are brought together the treasures of infinity will be found."

The water was boiling now but Li seemed oblivious to it. Lara said, "It's not a good idea to tamper with this Li. You have no idea what the treasures of infinity are. The Hindu Khmers were poor people hiding and guarding their sacred objects. A large stash of gold is unlikely."

Li reached into a shoulder bag he carried and brought out the Ruby Demon. "It is beautiful isn't it. And you have its companion." In his other hand there appeared a small automatic pistol, "now let's see if we can make a deal."

The soldier across the courtyard now had Croft in his sights. If she straightened up just a little more he would have a kill shot. It was a shot he would never take.

The stock of the shotgun broke as Ryan swung it hard into the man's head. The AK-47, the unconscious man and a piece of the shotgun stock crashed and clattered to the stones.

Li and Lara both looked backwards toward the commotion in the rubble. Instantly the surface of the pool broke and a creature the size of a truck, with scales, teeth and catfish tentacles, leaped from the depths. Li screamed and fired. The small caliber bullets may as well have been firing into a lake. The monster came down with a crash half a meter from Li. The giant jaws snagged him in a blink and leveraged him into the monster's gapping maw. His little pistol and the red idol went flying.

Lara stared in horror. Thrashing violently, the monstrous fish made its way back to the pool and with a splash that sloshed water in a large wave over the courtyard stones, disappeared back into the pool. "Welcome to infinity Mr. Li" Lara said.

Quickly Lara dropped the remaining 6 meters to the ground. Making a mad dash across the courtyard she barreled toward the opening left by the explosion. The water of the pool began to boil again. In a split second she grabbed up the Ruby Idol and ran for all she was worth.

When she reached Ryan she handed him the Red Idol. "Keep this in a safe place. Now we've got to get out of here. Quickly now." she exclaimed.

Ryan shook off his amazement. "What in the name of all Hindu Gods was that?" He managed to ask as they trotted through the jungle

Lara answered, "That my friend was Sudden Death."

—

Lara drove the jeep. Ryan drove the motorcycle to Batdambang. They left a half hour apart to keep the relics far apart. Lara was not sure what would happen bringing the two close together but so far the results had proven fatal. In Batdambang there was a parcel service and one was sent to England and the other to Buenos Aires. Ryan sold the bike to some tall Cambodian kid and they both rode in the jeep over the border to Thailand.

On the way they talked about their families and where they were headed next, Lara to the Outer Hebrides to examine a medieval monastery. Ryan to the Andes to investigate rumors of a resurgence of the Shining Path.

"Don't forget Ryan, it's still my artifact." said Lara.

"You can come and visit us any time you want to study it, " Ryan answered, "Or even if you just want to visit a friend."


End file.
